"Research kills opinion” is the mantra of today’s guest, Rachel Clemens, Chief Marketing Officer of Mighty Citizen. Rachel develops and analyzes donor surveys that uncover the truth about what donors are thinking and feeling about an organization. Today she shares best practices about design, implementation, and follow-up.

(17:09) Open-ended questions are great in personal communication, not so much in a donor survey

(19:39) Dolph resurrects the will to live

(21:26) The beauty of the survey

(23:15) Transparency and timeliness

(24:13) The Good Will Jar

(26:45) Swap Your Shop!

Nov 13, 2018

The Family Office with Ranlyn Tilley Hill, J.D.

33:26http://traffic.libsyn.com/nonprofits/ep_104_.mp3?dest-id=574799

Today Dolph speaks with Ranlyn Tilley Hill, J.D., president of Benevolent Vision. Ranlyn takes us behind the scenes to explore the inner workings of family foundations and the family offices that serve as conduits to that world of benefactors.

Today’s conversation is with two presenters from this year’s Bridge Conference. June Kress of June Kress Consulting and Chris Rutledge, Chief Development Officer at Friendship Place in Washington, D.C., used a five-skit format to demonstrate ways to encourage executive directors to fundraise, while still getting credit as a development director! In truth, June and Chris are recommending collaboration rather than craftiness. Join us for a fun discussion.

How’s your organization’s website looking these days? Dolph is joined by Jesse Lane, Chief Marketing Officer of Pure Charity, to discuss the three most common nonprofit website fails and their (sort of) quick fixes.

This week, join us as we revisit the question, “What are best practices of those nonprofits that make the transition from small budget to large budget impact and growth?” Kathleen Janus, author of Social Startup Success: How the Best Nonprofits Launch, Scale Up, and Make a Difference, emphasizes:

As busy professionals, we are always looking for opportunities to maximize the return on our efforts. This sentiment remains true when it comes to improving fundraising tactics.

Today we speak with Melissa Wyers, Executive Director of EveryAction, a CRM tailored specifically for nonprofits. Melissa talks about how automation can be used to develop more robust communication with and cultivation of donors…and save time to boot!

This Labor Day, we provide a refresher course on what it looks like to move toward a culture of equity in an organization. Daria Torres, founder and managing partner of the Walls Torres Group, guides us through the methodology and use of the Equity Maturity Model.

Dr. Joynicole Martinez, founder and CEO of The Alchemist Agency, believes the health of any population is established at the intersection of its housing, healthcare, and educational systems. Today she and Dolph talk about building the best boards to support the nonprofits that bolster those systems.

(12:40) The good, the bad, and the ugly - the reality of filling a board vacancy

(16:00) A board member’s necessary ability to politely challenge and be challenged

(20:30) The disconnected staff member

(25:10) As told by Joynicole: the untouchable, mystical board and the frightened staff members

(27:01) Lift Every Voice: Joynicole’s first occupation as a promoter/manager of gospel singers

Aug 28, 2018

Monthly Giving: The Sleeping Giant, with Erica Waasdorp

31:01http://traffic.libsyn.com/nonprofits/ep_95_.mp3?dest-id=574799

Donor cultivation can be tricky. Erica Waasdorp, author of Monthly Giving: The Sleeping Giant, reminds us that the monthly small-gift donor tends to be extremely loyal and may be an underdeveloped segment of your giving program.

(2:55) Growing up in the Netherlands: the inspiration behind monthly giving

(6:00) History lesson for all you young ‘uns

(8:45) Lamenting the loss of the land line

(9:30) Who converts to sustaining giving?

(11:57) Pioneers of monthly giving

(14:16) Let them know you know who they are

(16:30) Yes, your parents were correct – call or write to say thanks!

(18:25) The unexpected WOW!

(26:00) Little bits add up

(26:37) Footloose: How Erica became a dancer

Aug 21, 2018

Everything You’ve Always Wanted to Know About Mobile and Messaging (But Were Afraid to Ask) with Michael Sabat

33:55http://traffic.libsyn.com/nonprofits/94xx.mp3?dest-id=574799

We are all familiar with text messaging. Whether we use SMS, WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, or something else , we text practically every day. Michael Sabat, founder of @mssg, helps us apply our text messaging savvy to communication, marketing, and fundraising in the nonprofit world.

Have you ever tried to make a gift on a charity’s website, only to become frustrated by having to complete so many required fields that your attempt to donate timed out? Or how about getting through the form, only to hit the cancel button instead of the submit button because they were nearly identical? These are true events, and just a couple of examples of what to avoid when creating your organization’s online donation form.

Join us as we speak with Ira Horowitz, founder of Cornershop Creative. Ira describes how to make your nonprofit’s online donation form a thing of beauty – and revenue! Learn the do’s and don’ts of asking for gifts from your nonprofit’s website.

In part two of this episode, we continue our conversation with Sherry Truhlar, benefit auctioneer at Red Apple Auctions. Sherry details methods for improving small auction events (simplify, simplify), teaches us bidder psychology, and drives home the importance of M.E.S.S.

We are well underway on this bonus break series about succession planning, and this episode is about the often-discussed, hot topic of executive director contracts. We explore the pros and cons of offering the executive director an employment contract, specifically as they relate to transition planning.

Jul 23, 2018

Event 180: Flipping Small Fundraising Events on Their Heads for Better Revenues with Sherry Truhlar

In part one of this two-part episode, we speak with Sherry Truhlar, founder of Red Apple Auctions. Sherry tells us how she became an auctioneer and how organizations of all sizes can boost their fundraising revenue by fine tuning their techniques.

Some leadership transitions are straightforward – the executive director gives a month’s notice before their final day. These are often the simplest and easiest transitions to plan for, but the board needs to prepare for more abrupt and even temporary transitions.

In this bonus break, we will outline the four types of executive transitions your organization may experience and help you begin the succession planning process

Our guest today is Maurya Couvares, CEO of ScriptEd, a nonprofit that provides free coding instruction to students in under-resourced schools. Growing ScriptEd from 12 students in its first year to over 800 in year five is the wonderful success story Maurya shares with us. A major element of ScriptEd’s phenomenal growth is robust data collection combined with the savvy use of that data in fundraising efforts.

We received such strong feedback on the strategic planning bonus break series, that I’m now offering another series – this one on executive transition planning. In this seven-part series, we’ll discuss

What is a transition plan? Why do you need one?

The four types of transitions.

Good time to think about contracts

Developing your interim plan

Write your ED playbook

Reviewing and refreshing your plan

Hire a consultant or do it yourself?

In this first Bonus Break of the succession planning series, we explain the importance of transition plans.

There is tremendous energy in conflict. Harnessing that energy for good involves basic precepts outlined in Dr. Nate Regier's model of Compassionate Accountability. Join us as Nate advocates for a fresher and more useful understanding of conflict, and encourages us to engage with openness, resourcefulness, and perseverance.

For some of us, being a tad bit unorganized is part of our personality- a cluttered desk is calming and rummaging for a file or note becomes commonplace. However, repeatedly misplacing items is frustrating because you lose productive time with every search for a lost item.

Regardless of your place on the organizational spectrum, you will benefit from this conversation with Cris Sgrott-Wheedleton, founder of Organized Maniacs.

When interacting with the media, a nonprofit is concerned not only with getting coverage, but with obtaining the best coverage for the organization. Today’s guest, Antionette Kerr, CEO of Bold & Bright Media and founder of The Write Folks, LLC, is here to help. Antionette offers us sage advice on how nonprofits can generate exposure and optimize outcomes by creating strong media relations.

The ability to research prospective funders and develop a highly targeted list of possible foundations is a key skill that all grant writers must develop. Dolph shares how you can build a list of likely funders, narrow down the list, and create a great grant calendar.

You probably think a lot about employee benefits - whether you are an executive director, board member, or entry level professional. But when we think about employee benefits, we usually just focus on the “basic” benefits like health insurance, vacation time, and sick leave.

Today we speak with the CEO of Intrepid, Liz Frayer, who has built a career and a thriving business focused on helping employers provide quality benefits that employees truly value. Liz will share the secrets she has learned from over twenty years in the “benefits business.”

Taking time off work for self-care is essential. Sure, financial and work obligations are reasons to forgo vacation, but Dolph shares his tricks for making the time to take a trip - - - even when your budget won’t allow a vacation at the Ritz.

Jun 01, 2018

Military Veterans In The Nonprofit Sector with Lora Tucker (replay in honor of Memorial Day)

The brave members of our armed services put their lives on the line every day, and many return home as veterans with a strong desire to continue contributing to their communities. In honor of Memorial Day, we’re bringing you this conversation with retired Colonel Lora Tucker about veterans in the nonprofit sector.

May 29, 2018

The Leadership Wakeup Call with Jeb Banner

33:05http://traffic.libsyn.com/nonprofits/ep_85.mp3?dest-id=574799

Serial entrepreneur and CEO of Boardable Jeb Banner discusses the pending nonprofit leadership crisis, what your nonprofit can do to prepare for it, and how you as a professional can benefit from it.

Major gift fundraising is a team sport, and every strong team needs a playbook. Doug Barker is the nationally recognized designer of major gift playbooks for nonprofit teams, and he shares the purpose, components, and best practices of drafting and implementing your major gifts playbook.

When it comes time to hire a new member, there is a lot of pressure to settle for the candidate that seems sufficient but not stellar. Beware, settling for the short term actually causes more pain in the future.

Since many nonprofit professionals dream of becoming a grant writing consultant, we recorded this session with Susan Bacon. Susan, who built and sold a successful grant writing business, shares the nuts and bolts of how to start a your own grant writing consulting practice.

At this point in the planning process, the work group has spent two to three months to research and fully understand the organization’s history, constituencies, strengths, challenges, and opportunities.

So now it’s time to focus on strategic goal setting. Specifically, the work group needs to identify one or two strategic goals - you might call them big bold goals, big hairy audacious goals, or cathedral goals.

Some of us shy away from the pursuing a CEO position because we think we don’t have the personality, experience, or savvy to be a successful. We typically assume there is only one personality type for being a successful CEO, and this is misleading.

Today we speak with Kim Powell who shares insight from over 100 interviews with successful CEOs in her latest book, The CEO Next Door. This conversation:

As noted in the first two parts of this series, there is a lot of work involved in the environmental scan and reviewing the mission. In this segment, we discuss the role of the strategic planning work group and how to recruit high performing people to volunteer for it.

I bet your favorite brand makes you feel great every time you interact with them. Brands like Tiffany’s and the Ritz Carlton cater to our needs, but we don’t always treat our donors this way. In this episode, Rachel Muir shares stewardship techniques that will dramatically increase your individual donor loyalty and revenue.

Rachel Muir, author of Makeover my Board and founder of Girlstart, discusses how to enhance your donor cultivation by acknowledging all gifts, remembering donaversaries, making thank you calls, and getting to know donors as more than just a credit card or checkbook.

This bonus break is the third installment of a multi-part series about strategic planning. This episode focuses on developing a mission, vision, and core values that is both memorable and inspirational.

Feb 15, 2018

Make Your Board an Engaged Fundraising Machine with Kim Horton and Greg Giles

Today’s guests Kim Horton and Greg Giles discuss how to build a board that is excited about fundraising, community engagement, and community outreach.

Kim Horton is Director of Marketing and Communications at The Friends of the St. Paul Public Library (The Friends), and Greg Giles us the organization’s Vice President of Development and Community together, this dynamic duo demonstrates that connecting communication, money, and mission is essential for building an engaged fundraising board.

This Bonus Break is the second installment of a multi-part series about strategic planning. This series is based on a lunch and learned that I presented last month, and I am breaking the lunchtime presentation into several Bonus Break podcasts. The first part of the series was released last week, and it focused on determining if you need a new strategic plan and wheter your organization is ready to actually begin the planning process.

Once you are ready to roll up your sleeves and begin planning, it’s good idea to understand the stages of strategic planning. There are four distinct stages of strategic planning that we will discuss over the next several segments in this series, and these stages are: The environmental scan, drafting the initial strategy, board feedback, and finalizing the plan.

This bonus break dives into the first stage of planning process: The Environmental Scan

We haven’t talked a lot about Peer to peer fundraising on this podcast; which is funny because that was the core method of fundraising until just the last 60 or so years. Over the last several decades, Peer to Peer fundraising (or P2P as it is sometimes called) has taken a backseat to direct mail, targeted mail, and more recently crowdfunding.

But just as technology has made recurring gifts and viral giving opportunities possible, it has also breathed new life into Peer to Peer fundraising.

For this reason, we invited Mark Becker Founding Partner at Cathexis Partners to discuss Peer to Peer Fundraising. Mark’s particular specialty is using technology to generate even more money from Peer to Peer fundraising campaigns.

How long will it take? If we start now can we have a strategic plan next week (next month, next year)?

If we want a consultant to manage the process, how do we find the money to hire that person. And what does this consultant actually do?

What components should be in a strategic plan

How can I overcome objections to strategic planning

Last month, I answered these questions at a presentation at The Commerce Club in Atlanta. I felt it would be worthwhile to turn this into a series of blog posts. These posts might anger some nonprofit consultants because the isn’t always “go ask a consultant”

Culture develops organically, and it can be based on power, personality and politics if you aren’t paying attention to the culture you are building.

This episode focuses on building a culture that supports and nurtures the people in your organization. We speak with McKenzie Wren, the Chief Engagement Officer of Wren Consulting. She helps organizations build and manage teams by creating a culture on purpose. Today, McKenzie explains the importance of building a culture of understanding, mutualism, and positive energy. Specifically, she:

Nothing kills enthusiasm like long, disorganized, unproductive meetings, and this goes for all meetings. Whether a staff meeting or one on ones, we must make sure that all of our interfaces are productive and worth our time.

Learn how a commitment to attendance, communication, shared agendas, inclusion, participation, and more will warrant more productive meetings for your nonprofit.

Jan 25, 2018

How the Best Nonprofits Launch, Scale Up and Make a Difference with Kathleen Janus

Typically, we are into starting something new. People are into starting new nonprofits instead of joining forces with a nonprofit with similar organizations. Moreover, we have some $200,000 nonprofits that are not growing, meeting their mission, or increasing their impact. Many forgo the steps for scaling and optimizing significance when jumping to start a nonprofit, and this is problematic.

To further our understanding, we bring in social entrepreneur, lecturer, and Co-Founder of Spark™, Kathleen Janus. Kathleen discusses her upcoming book Social Startup Success: How the Best Nonprofits Launch, Scale Up, and Make a Difference as the playbook of how to support and play your role in the nonprofit sector. She emphasizes:

Are your gift acknowledgement letters connecting donors to your mission? Do you feel that donors cherish your thank you letters? Listen to this bonus break to learn some of the techniques necessary to craft and send sincere thank you letters that strengthen the relationship between you and your donor.

January is a great time to cultivate all the donors who gave to your organization in 2017. And one way to cultivate those who gave last year is by sending a thank you letter that shares the many accomplishments their 2017 gifts made possible. As an added benefit for your donors, this letter should also include a summary of all 2017 gifts that can be used for tax purposes.

Listen to this week’s bonus break to learn more about this best practice.

Jan 11, 2018

The Executive Director and Development Director Relationship with Emma Kieran

A strong relationship between the executive director and development director is vital to successful fundraising. In fact, these two staff must share mutual trust, open communication, and patience to achieve a charity’s fundraising goals.

We know the toll for a weak CEO-CDO relationship is significant:

Frequent fundraiser turnover

Frustrated donors

Failure to meet fundraising goals

Fumbled board fundraising

Every nonprofit professional agrees that a healthy CEO-CDO relationship enhances fundraising, but many non-profits suffer from a messy relationship between these key executives. For this reason, Emma Kieran, principal of PilotPeak consulting in Pittsburg, joins us to discuss ways a Chief Development Officer (CDO) and CEO can build a strong relationship.

If you don’t believe checklists work, ask an airline pilot. Even the most tenured pilot has a checklist with detailed steps to start the engine, taxi, and take-off. And when the plane lands, they have a different set of checklists to get passengers safely to the terminal.

In fact, checklists are one of the reasons why air travel is among the safest forms of transportation. Assuming you believe that your organization’s mission is important and provides essential programs or services, shouldn’t you use an annual checklist?

Sometimes, we are so focused on the mission that we forget to build our organization’s sense of team, communication, and empathy. Consequently, it’s not surprising that so many of us burn out multiple times in a nonprofit career.

To help us focus on empathetic leadership, we invite Carrie Rice, a nonprofit consultant based in San Francisco. Carrie specializes in using empathic techniques to build individual donor programs, board effectiveness and staff leadership training.

We explore empathic practices to improve relationships among staff, stakeholders, and the community you serve.

Most of us dream of taking extended breaks or sabbaticals to balance work and personal life. While charities rarely offer sabbaticals to every staff member, sabbaticals for all might build the vim and vigor your staff and organization need.

We talk to Marvin Webb, Director of Finance and Administration at Funders for LGBTQ Issues in New York City. Marvin shares:

How his organization came to offer sabbaticals for all staff

How Funders for LGBTQ Issues structures sabbaticals

How he used his sabbatical

As a bonus, Marvin also shares with us how to optimize strategic planning.

Change is hard. Change makes us uncomfortable. Change can feel like a loss of what we once knew.

But we also know that change is essential for a board and an organization to reach its full potential. As Maya Angelou once said, “We delight in the beauty of the butterfly, but rarely admit the changes it has gone through to achieve that beauty.”

We invited Meredith Emmett and Heather Yandow to offer insights from their recent Board Leadership Forum presentation. These two leaders from Third Space Studio share how to create an environment that nurtures new idea, and our conversation included suggestions on monitoring the “heat” of discussion, getting to know your board’s culture, establishing trust, and easing decision-making.

Word selection is important when conveying your message. We have to make sure that our tone and word choice has an impact that reflects our missions.

To help us, we invite Erica Mills, Senior Lecturer at the University of Washington's Evans School of Public Policy & Governance, Author of Pitchfalls: Why Bad Pitches Happen to Good People, andfounder of Claxon. Erica will share important insights about words, language, and building messages that resonate with your audience.

Board builder Rob Acton joins us to discuss specific strategies and tactics to optimize your board. He offers actionable tactics that you can implement today. Acton, founder of Cause Strategy Partners, discusses the three categories of tactics:

True collaborations help nonprofit organizations compete for grant funding and better implement their funded programs. In order to develop strong collaborations, however, prospective partners must determine available assets, while building mutual trust and expectations.

To explain how nonprofits can better collaborate and build a grant-seeking culture, we spoke with the Grants Manager of University of Florida and Author of Collaborative Grant-Seeking: A Practical Guide for Librarians, Bess Gail De Farber.

Nonprofits all over the country are in the middle of a very busy special event season. In fact, many fundraisers and event planners are putting those final touches on their October and November events, and this is the perfect time to prepare your board to be enthusiastic ambassadors and fundraisers at the event.

To help make your board members effective ambassadors and fundraisers at your next event, we invited special event guru and auctioneer Abra Annes back on the podcast. She shared several fresh and innovative ideas for board involvement that will be fun for your board members, while also generating significantly more revenue for your organization.

Shantel Khleif shares how she built a social media base with over 20,000 followers. She explains which platform is best for your nonprofit, ways to engage your followers, and whether you should be paying to boost posts and pages.

Highlights (timestamps):

(3:37) How Shantel built a base of over 20,000 social media followers (5:35) The ideal number of weekly social media posts (7:09) The user demographics of various social network platforms (9:41) Whether paid boosting of social media posts should be included in your marketing strategy (10:42) Why the number of followers is less important than your followers’ engagement (11:32) The social media platforms most appropriate for your nonprofit (16:10) Specific ways to use social media in your fundraising and marketing efforts (18:30) The importance of video content to tell your story (22:00) The danger in not responding to your social media followers (23:24) Using social media to increase transparency (27:40) How to know the best time to post for your audience

It seems like every nonprofit, business, and public personality has an email lists these days. Today we’ll learn how your nonprofit email list can better compete in this crowded arena – not just with similar nonprofits but also against your constituency’s grocery store, hair salon, house of worship, and civic group for that valuable in box attention. Our conversation today is with Mr. Leads himself, Carlos Scarpero and we touch on: (3:58) How to build a good list (4:55) The importance of getting permission to add people to your email list (7:22) An innovative new trend: “text to join our email list” (8:32) The problem with paper sign-up email list forms (9:59) The importance of segmenting your email list (13:30) The email list analytics you should pay attention to (14:06) Analyzing why people unsubscribe from your email list (15:30) How frequently you should email your list (19:06) Using auto-responder series to build your base (22:58) Best practices for nonprofit email lists (23:54) How to keep your mass email from being flagged as spam (26:05) The email practices that will poison your list (27:34) The number of staff hours necessary to begin an email marketing program

The nonprofit sector is risky business. There are unique laws that apply just to us; we have our own sections of the tax code; and we also must follow employment law, building codes, licensing requirements, and more. Of course, the press loves to go after charities gone wild and personal injury attorneys salivate at the thought of chasing an organization’s assets on the balance sheet. This is why we asked Justine Cowan to chat with us today about mitigating and insuring against the risk that we face as nonprofit organizations, as board members, and as staff members. Our conversation included: (6:34) How to structure your nonprofit to mitigate risk (8:00) The importance of annual state and Federal filings (10:10) The single greatest area of liability and risk for most organizations (11:52) The importance of training managers to manage (14:25) The role of mitigating risk with insurance (17:35) Mitigating risk when working with volunteers (19:58) The confusion about overtime rules for employees, as well as failure to classify contractors as employees. (26:14) Reasons the IRS revokes an organization’s tax-exempt status (30:00) Ensuring you have a strong conflict of interest policy (34:21) Indemnification of board members as an added protection for your leadership volunteers (37:29) The possibility of disputes arising around contracts (and lack of contracts)

Hard to admit, but it’s true: I sometimes lose focus on the one thing that I need to do to achieve my goals. And a day without focus can feel productive – I might still get a lot done; cross a lot of tasks off my list; but not be closer to meeting my ultimate goal. This episode’s guest facilitates The One Thing Workshop, which is based on Gary Keller and Jay Papasan’s book The One Thing. The book – and the workshop – help you focus in a world full of distractions. While his workshop is a full day training, I consider this a mini-workshop opportunity. So grab a cup of coffee and huddle up for this conversation about The One Thing. We discuss (time stamps): (7:10) The one focusing question our guest asks every day (14:00) How the inability to say “no” makes us less productive (15:13) The importance of getting comfortable with chaos (20:35) How to develop the willpower necessary to complete your most important task (26:21) How to build an organizational culture of focus (27:15) The four disciplines necessary to meet your goals (28:35) The importance of weekly accountability sessions (33:59) How to address a team member not meeting their goals (36:08) How to change a board culture if it only meets only once a month (at most)

We invited Dahna Goldstein on the podcast after reading her blog post Don’t Do It: Don’t start a nonprofit. After reading her thought provoking blog post, we did a bit of research. A few highlights from our conversation include (timestamp): (9:00) Why you shouldn’t start a nonprofit (17:30) Why you should consider starting a for-profit company instead of a nonprofit organization (20:15) How to tell if your organization is among the walking dead (24:20) The tech issues that nonprofit executives and board memberships should be thinking about (it’s not what you think) (29:00) How to garner financial support for your organization’s technology (36:15) The value of failure in the nonprofit sector (39:00) The one bad habit common in the nonprofit sector that we should avoid

Aug 22, 2017

Ep 49 - Building A Website That Gets Attention With Adam J Walker Of Sideways Eight

This week we enjoyed a lively conversation with the technological renaissance man Adam J. Walker. Adam, a minister turned tech guru, who founded the for-profit website development company Sideways8. He also started a nonprofit 48in48, which recruits volunteer coders to build 48 nonprofit websites in 48 hours and launched the podcast Tech Talk Y’all.

This episode has something for every nonprofit professional - whether you are a veteran, active duty, or never served in the military. Those who never served will enjoy a crash course in leadership and explore possible biases about veterans as employees (or bosses). Veterans and active duty listeners will gain valuable insight about transitioning into the nonprofit sector.

Patty Azzarello, author of the book MOVE and consultant to Fortune 500 companies, shares her expertise in implementing strategy despite reluctant staff, lukewarm boards, and competing priorities. This conversation will help you lead and implement your organization's strategic priorities.

When our offices are messy, our missions suffer. Every hour we spend looking a document, is an hour we aren’t writing a grant proposal, soliciting a donor, or recruiting a new board member. Every email or voicemail we don’t return in a timely manner, damages our organization’s reputation – as well as our own professional reputation. For some of us at nonprofits, losing an important document is just an occasional occurrence, while for others it happens every day. Whichever camp you fall into, this featured conversation with Cris Sgrott-Wheedleton will help you be more organized and more effective.

In a world where many people use "consultant" as a euphemism for being unemployed or underemployed, how do you select a highly qualified consultant for your nonprofit? Matt Hugg, who helps train and coach consultants, offers advice about how to choose the right consultant for your organization.

Jun 13, 2017

Ep 44 - A Six - Word Exercise To Engage More Supporters With Sandy Rees

A small class of new super-rich billionaires are using their largess to shape every aspect of the society we live in: education, government, policy, public health, and social services. We discussed this issue with David Callahan, author of “The Givers”, which carefully documents this phenomenon and the impact this trend is having on our society.

When others are afraid of the risk, the timing, or the possible failure, true leaders step forward to meet a need. In this episode, we speak with Dr. Jeff Thompson about his recently published book Lead True.

Nearly every organization has a cash-flow cycle. If you ever wonder how to better manage the cash-crunch, listen to this bonus break over a cup of coffee. In less than 15 minutes, you'll learn: (1:30) The importance of staying calm throughout the process (2:00) The three initiatives in your "cash crunch survival plan" (2:30) Three realistic ways to generate more cash quickly (5:42) How to address the financial difficulties when speaking to donors (6:47) How to get a funder to give you a bridge loan (7:30) Getting a line of credit from a bank - even when you have no collateral (9:40) A warning about using credit that every nonprofit should consider (10:38) How to make the cash you do have last longer

May 18, 2017

Ep 41 - Dealing With The Schmuck In Your Nonprofit With Jody Foster And Michelle Joy

We’ve all encountered a schmuck at work, and I’d be willing to bet that we’ve all been the schmuck at least once or twice in our lives. Nonprofits can be messy workplaces with people like Miranda Priestly (Meryl Streep’s character from The Devil Wears Prada). Of course, in the nonprofit sector, the schmuck might not be a staff member. The schmuck can also be a board member, a key volunteer, or an organizational partner. And a schmuck in any of these roles can dramatically derail your organization’s ability to meet its mission and suck the fun out of your relationship with the organizastion. In today’s episode, we’ll talk with psychiatrists Dr. Jody Foster and Dr. Michelle Joy about their new book “The Schmuck In My Office: How to deal effectively with difficult people at work”. During this episode, you’ll gain insight and ideas for dealing with the schmuck at your nonprofit.

This week we spoke with Rachel Spears, Executive Director of Pro Bono Partnership Atlanta. Our conversation highlights included: • The dangers of relying on your board member who is an attorney for advice on all your legal matters • The three greatest legal issues that nonprofits face today • Why organizations should secure legal counsel instead of navigating legal matters alone • How organizations outside of Georgia can find pro bono legal counsel • How to be a pro bono client that lawyers want to help

Featured Conversation with Andrea Kihlstedt, author of Capital Campaigns: Strategies That Work. We discuss getting your organization ready to conduct a capital campaign. Andrea is among the most respected capital campaign specialists in the country. In addition to authoring this book and several others, she has helped dozens of organizations conduct capital campaigns and co-developed the Capital Campaign course for the Fundraising school in Indiana.

Imagine an event where your donors are excited to buy a ticket, tell all their friends they are going, post it on Facebook and get even more pleasure from bidding competitively at the auction and giving generously to the solicitation. Abra Annes tells us how to make this event a reality.

A real story about a nonprofit staffing firm serving homeless people that bought a for profit company. The purchase enabled them to grow from a $2 million nonprofit to a $20 million organization and dramatically expand their impact among homeless people in their city. Listen to the episode to find out how they financed the purchase, the due diligence they exercised in the purchase, and what they will do differently the next time.

Late last week the White House released Donald Trump’s “budget blueprint” that outlines his spending priorities and cuts for the upcoming fiscal year. Knowing that this budget blueprint could have broad implications for nonprofits across the nation, we read the 62 page document, researched the agencies to be impacted, and summarized changes that nonprofits should anticipate in this 27-minute podcast episode.

If you go to the Foundation Center Library, you will undoubtedly see a crowded bookshelf in the strategic planning and strategic prioritization section. But one recent book stands out as a resource for the busy nonprofit leader who needs guidance and practical advice to focus their work and increase their impact: Mission Control by Liana Downey. Our conversation this week with Liana Downey offered some highlights from her book. This included: • Why organizations need to focus • How goal setting can support your focus • Using an option tree framework to focus (this will change your planning process) • Identifying what strategies will actually impact your mission

From the moment we get up in the morning until our eyes close at night, we are bombarded with marketing messages. Today we get marketing messages through our phone’s apps, online, via email, on the radio, on tv, and through the old fashioned postal mail. Is it any wonder that traditional marketing messages aren’t working? After all, we have to cut through a very cluttered marketing environment in order to reach our nonprofit’s prospective volunteers, advocates, and donors. This is why many nonprofits are turning to a content marketing approach that creates and distributes content that is relevant and valuable to our target audience. To help explore content marketing for your nonprofit, we spoke with Robert McGuire.

According to a 2015 Stanford Business School study, 78% of nonprofits were not prepared to name a permanent successor immediately if their executive director entered the witness protection program tomorrow, and on average organizations thought it would take them 112 days to find the replacement. This is why we have the rare professional known as the “interim executive director”, and we spoke with Lynne Molnar who has spent much of her professional life coaching organizations through these difficult transitions, screening prospective interims, training prospective interims, and being an interim herself.

Without a doubt, the best time to engage board members is when they first join the board, and orientation should play a critical role in the process. This Bonus Break will help you develop a more effective orientation process for your board.

The nonprofit sector is known for long work hours, where our passion and excitement for the mission seem to be a sustaining source of energy. But eventually, failing to care of ourselves takes a toll on our passion and every other aspect of our lives. Imagine if it was possible to have an impact without burnout? On this episode of the Successful Nonprofits Podcast, we speak with Beth Kanter, co-author of The Happy Health Nonprofit about how organizations can actually achieve both impact and happy employees who balance work and personal lives.

I’ve been thinking a lot about stories lately after reading an incredible book titled: The Story Telling Nonprofit by Vanessa Chase Lockshin. This is a practical guide to telling stories that raise money and awareness, and the Amazon reviews for this book are incredible. I found the book useful, and felt strongly that the principles Vanessa lays out in the book can be used whether you are in the nonprofit, for-profit, and government sectors. Our conversation with Vanessa Chase Lockshin includes: ➢ How nonprofits can use stories ➢ Identifying your audience and why create a faux person ➢ Elements of a good story And more! Be certain to download this episode and start writing more compelling stories for your nonprofit!

Jan 23, 2017

Ep 27 - Creating a 100 Day Launch-Plan for Your New CEO with Kim Powell

All too often, a new executive director runs from their job screaming (or with the board screaming at them). In fact, I’ve actually been known to congratulate executive directors who reach their two year anniversary by saying, “In my experience, those E.D.’s who last two years often enjoy successful tenures of 5 – 10 years.” There are many reasons why some executive directors don’t succeed during their initial two years. And an unsuccessful executive director is never the fault of just the unfortunate person who takes a job only to leave it 15 months later. To help understand how organizations can ensure a successful executive transition, we spoke with Kim Powell. Kim, who is with ghSmart, is a consultant and career coach who has advised CEOs and senior managers of Fortune 500 companies seeing transformational change through their corporate strategies. A few of the highlights from our conversation include: ➢ The 5 behaviors that make up the genome of a successful CEO genome ➢ Preparing to move past an iconic or founding leader ➢ Creating a 100-day launch plan and setup your new CEO for a successful tenure ➢ Developing a strong relationship between the board chair and CEO

It's the week before Christmas and New Year, and this is our 25th episode. At this time of year we often get to enjoy some well-deserved "down time" after the presents are opened, the leftovers are stored, and all the candy has been eaten. Many people use this down time to determine their New Years resolutions, and many resolutions relate to finding or being better at the work we love. For this reason, we combined our two most popular conversations about career building into one great episode.

We bring you a featured conversation about social enterprise with Paul Lamb. As part of our conversation, we discussed: • Understanding the culture shift that may need to occur within a nonprofit • Developing a tolerance for risk and delayed return on investment • Recruiting the right professionals to manage and grow the social enterprise • Finding the capital necessary to start a social enterprise

The relationship with the greatest impact on a nonprofit's success is typically the one between its executive director and board chair. While this important relationship determines the tone, direction, and long term success of an organization, cultivating it is often only an afterthought following a meltdown or disaster. That’s why we invited John Fulwider on the podcast to talk about his book “Better Together: How Top Nonprofit CEOs and Board Chairs Get Happy, Fall in Love, and Change their World”.

Wouldn’t you love to get data about individual donors at a broad range of other organizations? Would it be helpful to know the average percentage of individual donors who give online, or the average ratio between major donor and everyday donor? Would it be helpful if you could predict the return on investment in fundraising planning, development staff, or a CRM database? Back in 2010, Heather Yandow saw a need for this kind of data and used her math degree and decade of development experience to launch the Individual Donor Benchmark Project. The project consists of an annual survey of nonprofits to learn more about their individual donor strategies and achievements. Each year, her consulting firm Third Space Studio, produces a well-designed and easily understand Individual Donor Benchmark Report. This self-described data nerd has developed an incredibly useful body of data that you can use to evaluate your current fundraising program, inform your planning process, and advocate for additional resources with boards and funders. We explored some of the high points from the past five Individual Donor Benchmark Report, including: ➢ Universal truths about individual donor giving ➢ The one document that is the bedrock of all successful fundraising ➢ Why a 60% retention rate is probably good but an 80% retention rate may not be healthy for your organization ➢ The statistical ROI when paying for development staff ➢ How to take part in the 2017 IDBP

Learn how to get media coverage for your nonprofit this holiday season (or anytime). Every year, board members and executive directors wonder “how can we get our good work in the New York Times, the Wiregrass Gazette, or the Portland Tribune?“ To help you solve this puzzle, we invited media strategist Peter Panepento to join us. Peter is the principal at Panepento Strategies, a full-service content, digital, and social-media strategy consultancy serving many prominent nonprofit clients: Guidestar, National Center for Family Philanthropy, and the Chronicle of Philanthropy.

Nov 29, 2016

Ep 20 - What’s Wrong With Your Fundraising and How You Can Fix It with Ellen Bristol

We speak with author and fundraising consultant Ellen Bristol. Bristol’s effective fundraising counsel is the result of 4 decades of experience and data from over 1,000 nonprofits that completed the Leaky Bucket Assessment. This innovative online assessment measures nine key practices that contribute to or detract from your fundraising efforts, which are summarized in her book "The Leaky Bucket: What's wrong with your fundraising and how you can fix it".

Our world has changed dramatically in the last 24 hours. The morning of election day, the New York Times indicated that Hillary Clinton had a 90% chance of winning, but last night Donald Trump won the Presidential election. Many of us woke up this morning to an unexpected outcome and wondered, “How will this impact my family, my city, and my state”. For those of us leading and advising nonprofit organizations, we undoubtedly also wondered “what will this mean for my organization”? For this reason, I reached out to my alma mater: the Andrew Young School of Policy Studies at Georgia State University, which is known for bringing the lenses of public policy, social work, criminology and economics into focus. Since they have the premiere public policy program in the region, I knew they could offer an expert to help us make sense of the new realities nonprofits might face. Within hours, the Dean had connected me with Associate Professor Janelle Kerlin. Her research focuses on the politics and policies related to nonprofit development and operation. Dr. Kerlin holds a Ph.D. in Political Science from the Maxwell School at Syracuse University, a graduate social work degree from Columbia, and was a Research Associate at the Urban Institute. Our interview covers the following: Nonprofits are non-partisan but historically how are they been impacted by politics and the outcomes of elections? What impact will the Trump Administration likely have on government funding for nonprofits? Trump has said he is the only one who can fix the tax system. How might changes impact foundation giving or individual giving? How might Trump’s major campaign platforms on immigration, terrorism, and health care impact people who often use nonprofit-run social services? How will they impact international NGOs? Generally speaking, when will nonprofits begin to be impacted by these trends? How can nonprofits best prepare themselves to thrive over the next 4 to 8 years?

We spoke with nonprofit consultant Eleanor Boyd this week about the first two stages of the nonprofit lifecycle: infancy and adolescence. We discussed not just the key characteristics of infant (or start-up) organizations, but also the strategic steps organizations can take to transform themselves into more stable adolescent organizations.

Many of us (including this podcaster) start their career without thinking about their personal brand. But how we brand ourselves professionally shapes our career for years to come. In every stage of a nonprofit professional’s career offers opportunities to brand yourself based on your competencies, core values, and vision. To help us better understand how to brand ourselves, we spoke with Kristin Battista Frazee, who is truly a renaissance woman. Holding an MSW from Columbia University, she has been a geriatric social worker, legislative assistant at a Capitol Hill lobbying firm, published magazine and book author, marketing consultant, and personal branch coach for social and human service professionals. Our Featured Conversation included how to • Recover from low-points in a career • Make a positive lasting professional impression when leaving a job • Become comfortable with self promotion and personal branding • Build your brand online • Develop a classic elevator pitch in alignment with your core audience of potential employers • Find opportunities to promote yourself that is reflective of your values • Elevate your brand by writing for trade journals and presenting on your area of expertise

Today’s Featured Conversation is with CenterLink CEO Terry Stone, who has fun almost every day at work while building his national organization. In just a few months, Terry will retire from a long and meaningful career as a nonprofit executive. He had an interesting path to the top job, and proved himself a skilled leader. Since his first executive director, Terry has been a CEO at several different organizations As tribute to a true nonprofit leader, I asked Terry if we could have a conversation about a career well spent that would include advice for building your own career with intentionality and meaning. He offered five specific tips for a successful and meaningful career: ➢ Surround yourself with people who know more than you ➢ You’re going to make mistakes ➢ Learn each other’s work and communication styles, as well as what you each need to make decisions ➢ Get rid of the words: “I’m too busy…” ➢ Have fun! Terry and I dive deep into each of these tips, but also discuss discerning whether an organization is the right fit for you, managing productive board relationships, building stronger boards, and getting things done.

Today’s episode focuses on women-led philanthropy. For far too long, nonprofits and fundraisers neglected the power of women donors. According to the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University, female-headed households are more likely to give to charity and these women typically give more than their male counterparts. While many organizations are doing an abysmal job of cultivating women donors, some organizations are held up as shining examples. The United Way of Salt Lake is one such organization, which started a Women’s Leadership Circle and actively worked to cultivate female donors. This donor circle has grown tremendously and today boasts over 235 women each giving at least $1,500. To say the least, we wanted to learn more about how United Way Salt Lake cultivates and supports its female philanthropists and had the following conversation with Zenia Frendt, the staff person responsible for this important the Women’s Leadership Circle

The case for support isn’t just a tool for capital campaigns. As fundraising expert Linda Lysakowski notes, the case for support is an essential tool that ensures consistency among all fundraising and marketing efforts. Linda, who has trained over 30,000 fundraising professionals through her seminars and authored over a dozen books on the topic, shares her insight and expertise on developing and using the case for support. A few highlights of the conversation included: • Delegating just one author while including a variety of voices in the process • Using both emotion and reason in writing the case for support • Ensuring the case statement is written from a fundraising perspective (not just a marketing perspective) • Avoiding jargon and technical terms in the case statement • Helping all staff understand and communicate the case for support

As an executive search and transition consultant specializing in C-level nonprofit executives, Kevin Chase gives us a unique view of the search process. When I first booked Kevin for the podcast, I thought the conversation would be a great resource for nonprofits that might be seeking an executive director or development director. Once our conversation unfolded, however, I realized that this conversation was essential listening for those seeking executive level positions and those who aspire to be an executive director one day. For the prospective candidate, Kevin shares incredible advice on interviewing, providing references, and being authentic throughout the process.

* * * This episode contains explicit content * * * From a very young age, we are taught to fear failure. We might watch the disappointment in our parents’ faces when bringing home a low grade on a test in elementary school; experience the scorn of our peers when missing a shot in a big game during high school; and feel a dire sense of dread when our first boss tells us about something we did wrong. As a result, we learn to hide our failures in hopes that the world will never know that we messed up. But loss and failure – those moments we “fuckup” – teach us so much more than success ever does. As the late Pat Conroy said in his book My Losing Season “Loss is a fiercer, more uncompromising teacher, coldhearted, but clear-eyed in its understand that life is more dilemma than game, and more trial than free pass. . . . Though I learned some things from the games we won that year, I learned much, much more from loss.” In this featured conversation, we discussed: • The origin of FuckUp Nights • Why they brought it to Atlanta • The importance of an environment supportive of failure • Why high-profile speakers choose to publicly share their mistakes and what benefit they get from it • Future FuckUp Nights planned for Atlanta

Featured Conversation with Harry A. Freedman Harry Freedman has an extraordinary 40+ year career of producing and evaluating successful special events. During this time, Freedman was the driving force behind raising an estimated $20 million in the more than 250 big events he produced. There are few people on this planet with as much special event experience and expertise. Freedman, who is the author of the special events resource guide Black Tie Optional and the founder of Strategic Fundraising Initiatives, shared his insights for creating profitable and fun events. Our conversation included Tips for small organizations who want to produce a large events The three most important considerations for planning an event Common mistakes that organizations make with regard to budget, staffing/volunteers, and sponsors/underwriters Alternatives to doing a traditional special event. Links: Strategic Fundraising Initiatives: www.therightevent.org Black Tie Optional (book by Harry A. Freedman): https://www.amazon.com/dp/0471703338/ref=s9_asin_image_1/102-0304323-8977743?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=center-2&pf_rd_r=0G4VH3ERFQFHZGCJNXPT&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=288448501&pf_rd_i=507846 Harry A. Freedman’s Contact Information Email: haf4biz@aol.com Phone: 215-837-3007 Event Checklist: http://www.therightevent.org/ChronicleEventChecklist-07-16-2015.pdf Slide Presentation by Harry A. Freedman, Special Events During These Difficult Times: https://www.dropbox.com/s/j5ompyjui0fdl06/Harry%20Freedman%20Fundraising%20Summit%202015%20PowerPoint%20-HAF.pptx?dl=0 Article of the Week Denise Spivak For profit executive compensation can be controversial, but it’s significantly more controversial in the nonprofit sector. For this reason, we discussed Joan Garry’s article “Is It Okay for Nonprofit Leaders to Make Big Salaries”. We discussed “salary angst”, executive director contracts, compensation, and the “culture of can’t”, as well as ways that small nonprofits can address each of these. Links: Is It Okay For Nonprofit Leaders to Make Big Salaries by Joan Garry www.joangarry.com/nonprofit-salaries/?utm_source=JG+Newsletter&utm_campaign=1471d1f1f9-leader-salaries-20160713&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_40a7094ef4-1471d1f1f9-68655561

The Power of a Good Banker with Ashley Carson (Episode 9) Featured Conversation with Ashley Carson A strong and productive banking relationship is as important to your nonprofit organization as its relationships with funders and community leaders. Your bank can help smooth cash-flow with a line of credit; open doors for you to prospective major donors, partners; provide forecasting tools; serve as a business advisor; and even so much more. This week’s Featured Conversation with Ashley Carson will help us learn how to build a strong banking relationship. Specifically, we discussed: The difference between having a bank and having a banker Signs that you have a strong relationship with your banker How to tap into your banker’s network Benefits of banking with local banks When you know it’s time to talk to other bankers Links: Atlantic Capital Bank: http://atlanticcapitalbank.com/ Ashley Carson’s Contact Information: 404-995-6214 ashley.carson@atlcapbank.com Article of the Week Denise Spivak Denise Spivak of CenterLink joins us again for The Article of the Week. She’s sharing a great article by Pamela Barden titled Making It “All About Me” from the NonprofitPro website. The article is about being donor focused instead of treating our donors like human ATMs. Denise and I discuss the broader implications of being more donor focused. Links: Making It “All About Me” by Pamela Barden: http://www.nonprofitpro.com/post/making-it-all-about-me/#utm_source=nonprofit-pro-today&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_campaign=2016-07-07&utm_content=making+it+%27all+about+me%27-2

Featured Conversation with Chris Haley We had an amazing conversation with extraordinary development professional Chris Haley! Chris’ impressive fundraising bio includes significant major donor cultivation and solicitation in several large U.S. cities. In the 40-minute interview, Chris guides us through the major gift process of Identification Qualification Cultivation Solicitation Stewardship In explaining each of these steps of the major gift process, he also offers helpful hints and tips such as, The “Three A’s” of qualifying a prospective major donor The number of prospects you need for every major gift you receive The impact that Dunbar’s Number has on building relationships with donors Substitutional ways a major donor can give Want to know more? You’ll have to listen to our Featured Conversation with Chris Haley. Article of the Week Denise Spivak In her role as its Senior Director of Programs and Outreach with CenterLink, Denise Spivak is constantly on the lookout for ideas and resources for the more than 150 LGBT centers across the country that CenterLink serves. We were fortunate to have her share one of these articles with us: The Seven Tips to Create an Amazing Donor Cultivation Tour. Denise shared some of the ways their member organizations have used donor cultivation tours, and Dolph talked about an incredible donor cultivation tour he participated in while in Dehli, India (at an organization called Salaam Balaak Trust). Links: Gail Perry Article: The Seven Tips to Create an Amazing Donor Cultivation Tour: http://www.gailperry.com/7-tips-createl-donor-cultivation-tour/?inf_contact_key=52c444b419d696963d8b5276b8e72feedd124bb1a107a77050d2d7483243ab2f Information on the Salaam Baalak Trust tour: http://www.salaambaalaktrust.com/city-walks.html

Many people would rather be doused by a bucket of ice water than talk about HR regulations, but there’s an upcoming change to the overtime rules that will impact many nonprofit organizations. This Episode Includes a Featured Conversation with Gary Wheeler, a nationally renowned HR expert. Gary shares information about upcoming changes to overtime rules and how they may impact nonprofits across the country. Links: • Virtual HR Director: o Web: http://www.thevirtualhrdirector.com/ • Gary Wheeler’s Contact Information: o Email: gary@thevirtualhrdirector.com o Phone: 678-997-0017 Article of the Week The New Yorker magazine opinion piece titled “Philanthropic Fads” by James Surowiecki does a great job of assessing the long-term impact of the Ice Bucket Challenge. Do you remember when the ice bucket challenge went viral back in 2014? According to the ALS Association, over 17 million people uploaded their ice bucket challenge videos. You probably recall seeing new videos appear in your facebook feed every day. From your old high school friends, your organization’s CEO, and Hollywood’s biggest stars. You may have even taken the challenge yourself. In just a six-week period, that first challenge unexpectedly flooded the ALS Association with over $115 million in donations. At the time the organization’s annual budget was only about $20 million, so this was a huge boost. When the challenge went viral, many nonprofit leaders found fault with it. This great article addresses many of the criticisms by describing what actually happened in the two years since the Ice Bucket Challenge went viral. Links: • Philanthropic Fads in The New Yorker http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/07/25/als-and-the-ice-bucket-challenge • ALS Ice Bucket Challenge infographic: http://www.alsa.org/assets/images/ibc/ibc-steward-graphic.pdf • Dolph’s favorite ALS Ice Bucket Challenge with Patrick Stewart: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ty6-Ug1wk-0

Nonprofit Mergers: A more perfect union For decades, the nonprofit sector has sought cost savings and a better continuum of care through the strategic merge of two or more organizations. Some well known mergers have been phenomenally successful, while others feel like Absolute blunders. Our featured conversation this week is with Erik Speakman, a partnership and merge specialist who has successfully led facilitated many successful mergers. In our conversation we discuss: • How to know whether two organizations might be good partners • What are the costs associated with merging (and who funds them) • Why mergers driven entirely by funders are often less successful • The importance of due diligence that goes beyond just programs and financials to include organizational values and culture • The danger of merging without first developing a true partnership • The importance of relationships throughout the process • Consolidating two CEOs, boards, staff, and locations • Other pitfalls that sabotage organizations with an interest in merging Links: • Speakman Consulting: o Web: http://www.speakmanconsulting.com/ o Phone: 404-936-1211 • Nonprofit Mergers by David La Piana: https://www.amazon.com/Nonprofit-Mergers-Part-Considering-Negotiating/dp/0940069725/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1470066873&sr=1-2&keywords=la+piana Article of the Week Denise Spivak, the Senior Director of Programs and Outreach with CenterLink, introduced us to the NonprofitPro website with this week’s Article of the Week: 6 Steps to Volunteer Happiness by Katrina VanHuss. Happy volunteers make great ambassadors and supporters for an organization, and this article helps us understand how to recruit, engage, and retain truly happy volunteers. Links: • 6 Steps to Volunteer Happiness: http://www.nonprofitpro.com/post/6-steps-volunteer-happiness-low-price • Volunteer Management Practices and Retention by the Urban Institute: http://www.nationalservice.gov/pdf/Management_Brief.pdf • CenterLInk: www.lgbtcenters.org

Revoked! Protect Your Tax-Exempt Status Atlanta area accountant Anthony Sampson joins us for today’s podcast to talk about automatic revocation of tax-exempt status. Earlier this year, I met with the board of a small nonprofit organization, and a board member indicated that they were “too small to have to file an IRS form 990 of any sort”. My warning antenna shot up, and I suggested they were probably required to file one. Of course, I was clear that I am not a CPA or qualified to provide tax advice, so I offered to connect them with a a local accounting firm that works with a number of nonprofits. After making the introduction, I did a little bit of research and was shocked at what I found out. In calendar year 2015, the IRS revoked the federal tax-exempt status of more than 41,500 nonprofit organizations that failed to file a Form 990 for three consecutive years. That’s just the tip of the iceberg: the IRS has revoked the tax-exempt status of over 635,000 nonprofit organizations since implementing this rule in 2010. With only about 1.8 million nonprofits in the nation, about a third of all nonprofits have been subject to revocation. Scanning the names and locations of those with revoked tax exempt status, the list represents a diverse group of nonprofits, including ministries, associations, fraternities, volunteer fire departments, sports clubs, social service providers, arts organizations, PTA’s, and more. After learning these jarring statistics, I knew it was essential that accountant Anthony Sampson join us for the featured conversation. Links: • IRS: www.irs.gov • Anthony Sampson’s Contact Information: sampson.anthony2012@gmail.com 770-900-0410 Article of the Week: Get Intersectional Leanne Rubenstein, Executive Director of Compassionate Atlanta, joined us for the Article of the Week by Kristin Moe: Get Intersectional: Why you can’t go it alone in Yes Magazine. This article on intersectionality applies to nearly every organization. Whether an art museum, a homeless shelter, an educational institution, or a civil rights organization, we can all get a little more intersectional. Links: • Yes Magazine: Get intersectional Why you can’t go it alone http://www.yesmagazine.org/planet/get-intersectional-why-your-movement-can-t-go-it-alone • Compassionate Atlanta: http://www.compassionateatl.com/

Getting More Grants with Laurie Nichols The featured conversation today is with Laurie Grant Nichols. As her middle name would suggest, she is indeed an expert on grants and shares insights into the foundation cultivation and grant writing process. Whether you are a newer nonprofit trying to get grant ready, or a larger organization that could fine tune its foundation cultivation, this may be the most valuable conversation you hear all week. You will learn about: • Getting your organization grant ready • Using online foundation directories • Cultivating foundations to get more grant proposals funded • Outsourcing your grant writing (pros and cons) • Following up after a foundation declines your request Links: • Capitol Results, LLC: https://www.facebook.com/CapitalResultsLLC • Grant Station: www.grantstation.com • The State of Grantseeking Report: http://grantstation-trendtrack.com/state-of-grantseeking/spring-2016-state-grantseeking-0 Article of the Week Marvin Webb shared the article of the week: How to be Your Own Executive Assistant in Three Easy Steps from the Zen Habits website. The article is no longer available at that website, but channel a bit of Zen and check them out: www.zenhabits.net Once upon a simpler time, you received mail once a day delivered inside little paper envelopes, you had only one work phone, a receptionist took messages and made excuses for you, and, if you were a senior manager, you had an assistant. If you rely on a watch to tell you the time, you remember that simpler era. Today, however, we get e-mail throughout the day, have multiple phone numbers, text and messenger apps, and, bizarre as it seems, we are surrounded by more paper than ever before. Isn’t it ironic that our work lives are more complicated than ever before but we don’t have a dedicated person to help us sort through the clutter. Links: • Bamboo HR: www.bamboohr.com • Survey Monkey: www.surveymonkey.com • Doodle scheduling app: www.doodle.com • Expensify app (Expense tracking): www.expensify.com • Genius Scan (PDF Scanner for your phone): http://thegrizzlylabs.com/

Measuring Outcomes with Khurram Hassan Big data. Small data. Sometimes no data. For something so important, we often don’t know enough about how to collect and analyze our organization’s most important outcome measures. For this reason, I sat down with data guru Khurram Hassan who provides strategic planning, evaluation, and program design consulting to nonprofits, foundations, and governments. During this conversation we discussed: • Reasons for collecting and analyzing evaluation data • Determining the right information to collect • Collecting data without burdening staff • Logic models • Resources for nonprofits interested in evaluation design Links: Khurram Hassan’s consulting website: http://www.advantageconsultingllc.com/ Kellogg Evaluation Handbook: https://www.wkkf.org/resource-directory/resource/2010/w-k-kellogg-foundation-evaluation-handbook University of Wisconsin publication “Enhancing Program Performance with Logic Models”: https://fyi.uwex.edu/programdevelopment/files/2016/03/lmcourseall.pdf University of Wisconsin publication “Developing a Logic Model: Teaching and training guide”: https://fyi.uwex.edu/programdevelopment/files/2016/03/lmguidecomplete.pdf Article of the Week I flew solo for the article of the week: Putting Your Major Donors to Work Can Help You Raise More Money by author Joe Garecth of The Fundraising Authority blog. With almost two decades of fundraising experience, I have learned first hand the importance of getting donors meaningfully involved. Garecht offers some excellent ideas for engaging major donors as volunteers, and I suggested using Story Corps as an additional opportunity to recognize and highlight your donors. Article of the week: http://www.thefundraisingauthority.com/donor-cultivation/major-donors-work/ https://storycorps.org/

Featured Conversation with Clarence Patton Many nonprofits are seeking opportunities to create more inclusive and diverse boards and staff, and Clarence Patton is an expert in this area. He serves as the Director of the LGBT Pipeline Project and its Pipeline Consulting affiliate program. We discussed: The difference between being diverse and being inclusive. Signs that an organization is ready to begin the work of becoming more inclusive. Tools that organizations can use to begin a self-assessment. The process Pipeline Consulting and Pipeline Project use to help organizations become more welcoming and inclusive. Whether board give/get requirements are an impediment to creating diverse boards. ​​ You can find more information about Clarence Patton & LGBT Pipeline Project: http://lgbtpipeline.org/ http://pipelineconsulting.org/ ​ Article of the Week With Leanne Rubenstein Leanne Rubenstein, Executive Director of Compassionate Atlanta and a Consultant with The Goldenburg Group, presents the article of the week: A Day in the Life of an Executive Director by Joan Garry. We discussed how this article accurately depicted life as an executive director: starting your day early, ending it late, having lots of meetings, and experiencing both emotional highs and lows. The article also drives home the importance of self-care for executive directors, as well as a commitment to continued growth and change.

Featured Conversation With Gary Hines It seems many workers in the for profit sector spend their days dreaming about being a social worker, running a homeless shelter, or being the artistic director at a nonprofit theater. During my nearly 25 years in the nonprofit sector, hundreds of people have wistfully told me they would love to transition from the for profit sector to the nonprofit sector. Since so many people have shared this dream with me, this first episode includes a featured conversation with career coach Gary Hines. Gary will share deep insights for anyone thinking about a major career shift (even for those already working in the nonprofit sector). Gary discusses: Recognizing skill sets that transfer between sectors Managing common speed bumps in the transition Understanding the benefits of coaching for people in career transitions ​​ Gary Hines' contact information is below: www.garyhinesconsulting.com gary@garyhinesconsulting.com 215-264-6847 Article of the Week With Marvin Webb Marvin Webb, Chief Operating Officer at Funders for LGBTQ Issues, presents the article of the week: An Everyone Culture: Becoming a Deliberately Developmental Organization. We discuss how strengthening employees also strengthens your organization. We also learn about an innovative staff development practice at Marvin's organization that provides each employee with a self-directed personal development fund. Staff have used it to attend workshops, take up yoga, and even participate in a metal working class. Be sure to listen to this segment to find out how self-directed personal development works at his organization.